


Peregrinate

by Lertsek



Category: NCT (Band), WAYV
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fantasy, Character Death, Dragons, Lore Fusion, M/M, Mild Sexual Content, Other Ships Not Mentioned in Tags, Sad Ending, Witches, and a whole other lot (of silly humans)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-21
Updated: 2019-07-21
Packaged: 2020-07-10 08:01:53
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 13,090
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19902442
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lertsek/pseuds/Lertsek
Summary: When Lucas meets Jungwoo in a village that’s being terrorized by a fire breathing monster, he realizes that the dragon is not the only puzzle he wants to solve.





	Peregrinate

**Author's Note:**

> A wise man once said that you should never laugh at live dragons. 
> 
> Also a quick thank you to my favorite gorgon (you know who you are) for reading this in the early stages and letting me rave about it while simultaneously trying not to spoil anything.

Lucas loves riding at the break of dawn when the world has not yet woken up. When it is nothing but him, his horse, the land draped in morning sun, and his voice starting up another song. 

He likes to leave towns in the early hours when the villagers themselves have not yet woken up. Lucas never stays long in one place after all, there are too many places he has yet to see. 

Lucas has seen the snowy mountains up north, has visited the icy caves where there are supposed to live trolls who you can hear at night if you tilt your ear just right.

Lucas has seen the desert, ridden through part of it, almost died in it from dehydration. He and his horse have been through too many woods to count, trotted through every plain and meadow. 

Lucas has seen the beaches with water as clear as glass. Has ridden over the water pass in the west where a water snake resides. Which turned out to be a fake tourist trap—and a stupid one at that—the tourism has taken a real drop since someone coined the thought that maybe a giant human-eating serpent lives under the waves. 

His horse and he have seen much, but not enough. There is always more out there, always more to see. Lucas is long not done exploring what this world has to offer him, long not done searching for the mysteries she holds, lying around every corner, waiting to be found. 

That is why, when a man who has drunk one too many beers tells Lucas that a fire breathing dragon was spotted not two hundred miles west from the tavern they are in, Lucas does not turn tail and go east. Instead, he asks for the fastest route and sets off for the village closest to the sighting at the ass crack of dawn.

* * *

Home is not a place for Lucas anymore. The word conjures up images of a village he has long since left behind and never returned to. 

He grew up in a small fishers village hidden between the mountains. A village that thrived more on gambling than it did on seafood. Lucas grew up with a fishing rod in one hand and a die in the other. 

Fishing came to him more than gambling did. But when his mother fell ill, he sold his rod and spent his days trying to gather up money for her treatment. 

The local doctor couldn’t tell what was wrong with her, and Lucas did not have the funds to take her to the next village. No matter how pitiful everyone else finds you, they will not let you win in a gambling match, not when there is not only money but also pride on the line. 

His mother grew iller, and he himself more desperate. 

Lucas had heard of the woman in the woods, with her wretched nose and slit through her eyebrow. He had heard of her crooked back and her long ugly fingernails. Lucas had also heard of her abilities, some of them good, most of them not. But when you are desperate, you will try anything. 

So Lucas walked through the trees, searched the entire forest until he stumbled into the same clearing he had passed at least twice. The third time, however, it housed a wooden cabin that wasn’t there before. 

The woman that opened the door to him was everything the village kids had described and more. There was an ugly wart on her cheek with a hair poking out of it and when she spoke her breath smelled like rotten goat cheese. 

She did not let him into her house. She sniffed, and with her chin tilted up and a look that said Lucas was nothing more than the dirt on the bottom of her shoe she said, _a life for a life._

Lucas might not have been the smartest kid in his grade but he knew what she meant. 

What do you do when you think your mother is not going to make it through the night? What do you do to make her live to see another day? Lucas was fifteen years old when he looked a witch in the eyes and made a deal with her. 

The next morning, his mother was back to full health, preparing breakfast in the kitchen like she wasn’t on her death bed the night before. Lucas was happy, his mother lived and she was healthy, that was all he could ever ask for. 

But over the weeks he started to notice little quirks she didn’t have before. A spasm of her arm when she was stirring through a pot with a spoon, like the limb wasn’t entirely hers to control. Or the way her smile never reached her eyes like it did before, always stopping just before they would crease. 

At first, he brushed it off as a side effect of the magic. But as the weeks went on, he realized that this woman was not his mother, not fully. The little quirks started turning into something more, something dangerous. Lucas could feel how she would look at him when she didn’t think he’d notice. He saw how she started to be drawn to sharp objects, how she held them. Lucas started getting scared.

Every night while he would lie in bed—a pillow clamped over his ears in an attempt to drown it out—he would hear the voice of the witch echo through his mind. _A life for a life, a life for a life, a life for a life._

Lucas was sixteen when he came downstairs one evening and saw the woman that wore his mother’s skin stab the cutting board repeatedly. He was sixteen when she turned to him with her torn up smile and depthless eyes and said in a voice that was not hers to _go back to bed honey._ Lucas was sixteen when he ran from his home and never looked back. 

Home is not a place for Lucas anymore. Home has become the road he travels on. 

When people ask him where he is from, he tells them he comes from far. They never ask for more. Not until the night Lucas throws his exhausted body down into a seat in the local tavern—having just given his equally exhausted horse to the stable boy—and a man sits down in front of him with the same question. When Lucas gives his usual response, the man tilts his head to the side curiously and asks, 

“Where is far?” 

The man before him is young and boyish, hair windswept and clothes much the same. He looks like he just stepped out of a whirlwind. His eyes are big and his grin even bigger. For some reason, Lucas does not want to lie. 

“No one has ever asked me that,” he answers instead. 

The man laughs at his nonanswer and leans back. He looks at the bar and then back at Lucas, considering. The man’s rumpled shirt is unbuttoned at the top and there is a piece of collarbone peeking out. He is a local, Lucas can see it by the way he’s comfortably slumped in his seat, unlike Lucas himself, who has not stopped feeling out of place since the second he rode into this town. 

Lucas could taste something in the air when he rode through the eastern gate. At first, he thought it was just the fact that he was in a new village that unsettled him. But Lucas has stayed in many villages, passed through even more, it is rare for him to feel uncomfortable in a new one. 

It wasn’t until he looked more closely at the people that he realized what it was that hung in the air, what it was that was oozing off of all of them.

_Fear._

The man before him is a local, but there is something to the guy’s posture, something strange, like his bones don’t quite fit right. Lucas lets his eyes wander to the collarbone again. 

The man rises, having made up his mind. Lucas thinks he’s going to leave, but to his surprise, the man puts his hands down square on the table and bends forward. “Let me buy you a drink, then you can tell me what the sea looks like.” 

Lucas sees the challenge in the eyes before him. He leans into it, matches the man’s grin with a grin of his own and says, “Alright.” 

Jungwoo is an enigma. He shares things about himself but he holds back even more. He tells Lucas he loves the rain but hates swimming. He loves to eat but can’t cook to save his life. He has never left this town even though he hates it here. When Lucas asks why, Jungwoo shrugs his shoulders and says it gets too dry in the summer before redirecting the conversation back to Lucas. 

The more Jungwoo reveals, the more questions Lucas has. Probing the boy before him for answers is a lot like fishing. When you get impatient and move too quickly, it’s back to square one. But Lucas grew up in a fisherman’s village. He has learned patience, he’ll play the waiting game.

For Jungwoo, it must feel the same. Lucas talks about the places he has seen, the villages he has passed through and the mountains he has ridden up. He confesses he won his horse in a gambling match and now he treasures her to death. He does not tell Jungwoo why he is above average at throwing die. 

After his third beer, Jungwoo inquires about his home again. “So, how can you best catch a carper?” 

Lucas swallows the last of his beer down and puts his cup back on the table. “You throw a line and hope it bites.” 

Jungwoo’s eyes follow along as Lucas wipes his mouth with the back of his hand. When he places it back down on the table, Jungwoo picks it up between both his own. Carefully and oh so very slowly, he traces the calluses on Lucas’s hand with his thumbs. “If I ask you to come home with me, will you say yes?” 

The size difference between their hands is laughable. “Yes,” Lucas answers, his voice having a raw edge when he pushes the word out. 

Jungwoo’s voice is as soft as his skin. In conversation, there is no lower or higher pitch, his voice almost monotone. But it’s soft, almost shy. From the way he asks questions you’d think he could shatter into a million pieces at any second. But Lucas knows better. He knows that Jungwoo speaking so softly has nothing to do with him being insecure or timid, it is quite the opposite, he feels comfortable. 

Lucas knows better because he discovers that Jungwoo’s voice can raise three octaves when Lucas hits his prostate just right. Jungwoo is the most vocal person Lucas has ever slept with. He doesn’t clamp a hand over his mouth or bite his lips to smother his moans, just throws his head back and screams louder. 

While Lucas has Jungwoo splayed out under him on the mattress, all the mystery is thrown off of Jungwoo’s skin and it leaves behind a person that grabs Lucas’s hair tighter and rasps in his ear to _go fucking faster._

When they’re done, Jungwoo throws him out onto the street. “Come again if you want.” Are the words he parts with as he slams the door in Lucas’s face. 

To both their surprises, Lucas does.

* * *

He walks back to the cottage the next day and asks if Jungwoo can show him around. _It’s a small town,_ is Jungwoo’s response. Lucas laughs, _I get lost easily._

Jungwoo takes him past the market and the blacksmith, Hendery, who according to Jungwoo should spend his days and talent in the capital forging swords instead of reshaping pitchforks. 

Lucas gets introduced to the local priest, who is known by everyone and knows everyone in return. He comes to Lucas with the introduction of _my name is Taeil, I haven’t seen you before._ Taeil’s hands are warm and his smile even warmer. Up till now, he is the only one Lucas has met that seems genuinely welcoming. 

Lucas asks if there are never people who pass through this town. Jungwoo answers that, yes, there are, they just never stay for more than a night. 

Their final stop is the bakery and Jungwoo says that he really has to go now because his shift started an hour ago. 

“I thought you couldn't cook?” 

“I can’t, but I can bake,” is the response Jungwoo throws over his shoulder as the door swings shut behind him, leaving Lucas to stare at a big sign saying: open. 

Lucas goes to find out what he came for. He goes back to the market and asks around, trying to pry answers out of everyone that will even spare him a glance. 

The people get uneasy when he asks them about the dragon. Instead of answers, he gets more questions thrown his way. _Why would you go after a thing like that? What are you planning to do once you’ve found it? Pet it? Adopt it like a stray cat?_

Some of them even get angry. _Go take a look at the woods, see for yourself what that thing can do._

They advise to go to the woods and take a look, so that is what Lucas does. He takes his horse and rides out of the southern gate. 

It isn’t long before he realizes why the people in the village got defensive. He didn’t see it when he first arrived in town, having entered through a different gate and above all, moonlight alone could not show him the extent of this wreckage. 

Where there should have been trees to go on for miles there is nothing but ash. Scorched down branches and darkened stumps. Lucas realizes that it wasn’t only fright he heard in the villagers' voices, there was also hatred. They don’t only fear the dragon, they despise it. 

Because the only thing Lucas has is more questions, he goes to the one place in any village where there are people liberated enough to give answers. Lucas goes back to the tavern and orders a pale ale. 

The man behind the bar is so short, Lucas towers over him even while sitting down. But the aura the man exhibits speaks loud enough for him. That, and the two sleeves of tattoos that run up his arms. _That’s my name,_ he says with a grin when he catches Lucas staring at the big number inked on the inside of his wrist. Lucas catches the outline of a cat between all the heavy artwork and almost laughs. 

“It rained,” answers the man to Lucas’s question of how the fire was put out. 

The only water in the village comes from what courses through the sewers and the well in the middle of town. The village is miles from the sea and a simple stream running through the woods doesn’t put out a big fire like that. 

“It rained,” Lucas repeats disbelievingly. 

Ten nods. “It did. Came falling right out of the sky. Just in time too, or the entire village would’ve been burnt to the ground.” 

“Aren’t you afraid of it coming back?” Lucas asks. 

The man laughs at that, a harsh sound from the back of his throat that indicates that there is nothing funny at all. “You’ve seen the people, everyone is terrified.” 

“Then why don’t you leave?” 

Ten motions to the shelves on the walls and the bottles that stand on them. “I’m just supposed to pack all this up and leave?” He shrugs his shoulders. Lucas wonders if the tattoos go on beyond Ten’s shirt sleeves. “Besides, where are we supposed to go? All I and everyone here know is this fucking village.” 

Lucas makes a note in the back of his mind that hating your own village seems to be the trend around here. “The north’s pretty good this time of year,” he suggests. 

Ten stares back at him with eyes so wide it looks like he has just seen a ghost. “North? My man, do you know how low those temperatures drop in winter.” 

Lucas grins because yes, he does know how low they go. “Oh they drop like a bitch.” 

Ten’s eyebrow peeks up. “So you’ve been there then?” he asks as he refills Lucas’s glass with eyes almost as sharp as the grin he carries. “Seen the north?” 

Lucas nods, taking a sip before answering. “I’ve seen a lot. Never enough though.” 

Ten grabs another glass from under the wooden counter and pours himself a drink as well. “Start with the north and we’ll go from there,” he says, bringing his own glass to his lips. “Is it true that you can hear the trolls mumble at night?”

* * *

Ten advised him to check northeast of the village, for that is where the dragon had flown off after burning the southern woods. 

Lucas rides all day but the beast is unfindable. He rides up the steep pass and checks the caves hollowed out into the mountain, but there is no sign of a fire breathing monster, no trace left behind. A beast of that caliber going up into thin air after almost setting fire to a village.

He returns back to the inn with no leads, but Jungwoo waiting for him, looking more put together than the last time Lucas saw him. 

“I heard you got cozy with Ten last night.” Even in this small a village, Lucas is astounded at how fast news travels. And not exactly news, but a lie as well. 

Lucas is not going to deny the thought of taking Ten back to his room at the inn just above the tavern had not crossed his mind. The thought of splaying him out on his bed and tracing all the tattoos with his mouth that Ten told him continued past his arms. But the fact is, Lucas had not done that, instead they had laughed about how Lucas had hallucinated talking cactuses and naked woman when he went too long without water in the desert. 

So he answers with, “He is a good conversation partner.” 

Jungwoo sidles up next to him, as quick as a viper. “Should I be jealous?” 

“I don’t know, should you?”

Jungwoo raises his hand and pushes Lucas’s hair back. He looks at Lucas like he is a prey. “I don’t think I should.” 

With Jungwoo carding a hand through his hair, Lucas’s cool facade is starting to slip. Lucas lets himself lean slightly into the touch. “I’m flattered to think you would be.” 

Jungwoo brings his lips to the crook of Lucas’s neck. “You were the one who came to my home the morning after.” He says it so lowly it’s almost a whisper. The hand in Lucas’s hair stops moving. It tightens. Jungwoo puts his mouth to the shell of Lucas’s ear and drops his voice down even more. “Tell me, was I that good a fuck?” 

Lucas scoffs but turns his head slightly so they are cheek to cheek, faces mashed sideways against one another. Jungwoo’s breath is hot against his ear. “Has anyone else ever made you scream so loud?” he asks. 

Jungwoo rips his hand out of Lucas’s hair and takes a step back to create distance. He puts his hands behind his back to feign innocence and smiles with eyes like crescent moons. “Get cleaned up, I’ll see you for dinner in an hour.” 

With the atmosphere ruined, Lucas falters in his reply. “What?” 

“And to answer your question, yes, someone has made me scream, even louder than you did actually. So you’ll just have to try harder next time.” 

Jungwoo lives in a small cottage towards the southern edge of town. Well attended to plants surround the house and there is a wind chime hanging from the soffit, a little bell strung up to hang below it that dances with every breeze. 

The interior of the house is nothing like the exterior. Whereas the outside is neat and clean, the inside is a rearranged mess. It touches Lucas’s heart a bit that Jungwoo at least tried to clean up for him. There are still papers strewn about everywhere, book stacks pushed into corners, some of them on the verge of falling over. A creeping fig crawls over the overfull bookshelf, which, after further inspection, seems to also fulfill the task of stand-in wine rack. 

In the kitchen, cutlery is thrown as a haphazard onto the counter and there are three cutting boards out all with different kinds of herbs on them. The house is still a mess, but compared to the last time Lucas saw it, it is in a better state. 

The dinner is nothing like the drinks they shared at the tavern. It isn’t filled with sexual undertones, there are no snarky remarks behind every corner. Jungwoo doesn’t hold his body carefully, doesn’t arrange it to not let secrets slip past. Lucas thought the Jungwoo he first met was interesting, but in his own home the man comes to life and it is a sight to behold. 

Jungwoo pours wine instead of beer and laughs when Lucas spits it back out. Jungwoo tells him about the well in the center of the village and how the parents make their children believe there are pixies hidden between the stones so they don’t climb in. 

He talks more about his upbringing, about him getting the job at the bakery because his father used to say that a good homemade apple pie could solve any problem. _In hindsight,_ Jungwoo says, _I should have known it was only a ploy so that I would bake him one every saturday._

When Jungwoo asks where Lucas’s parents are, he says his father was never around. Lucas puts his knife down and tells Jungwoo his mother is dead.

He also shares that his mother was the one that told him all the tales of the lands. He shares with Jungwoo how she would sit next to his bedside at night and tell him about all these different places that seemed so far away. 

“She always wanted to see the sunflower fields in the west,” Lucas confides. 

Jungwoo unconsciously sloshes the wine around in his glass. The evening has been mostly relaxed, but there is an edge to Jungwoo’s exterior that won’t go away. It hasn’t disappeared even after three glasses of wine. 

“Did you visit them?” Jungwoo asks. 

They’ve moved over to the couch, slumped in their seats, legs a tangle between them, letting their food settle in their overfull stomachs. Jungwoo is a good cook and a liar, but Lucas has filed both of those facts away for later. 

“I did,” he answers. 

Only years after he left home did he visit the fields. He thought he’d regret leaving home when he stood there, maybe even get emotional. But he didn’t. Instead he felt small, standing between rows of yellow flowers towering over him, their stems twice his height. He had felt suffocated in the same way that he had felt liberated. The combination of the two left an uneasy feeling in his stomach but it also left a taste for more. 

Jungwoo listens to him describe the feeling and smiles. Not a pitiful smile, a hopeful one. “I’d like to see them,” he says. 

Lucas looks at the boy before him in his cramped house full with ink-stained papers and dirty knives. He looks at the little dimple Jungwoo’s smile brings with. He looks at Jungwoo’s eyes full of things that have yet to be told. Luckily, Lucas knows how to be patient. “Maybe I can show you one day,” he responds. Jungwoo’s smile widens.

* * *

Jungwoo reintroduces him to Ten, his closest friend and the only one in this goddamn town that knows how to make a good drink. Jungwoo’s words. 

Lucas spends most of his nights tucked away in the corner booth of Ten’s tavern with Jungwoo and Johnny, the owner of the bakery that Jungwoo works at. Ten joins them often with attentive ears, coaxing story after story out of Lucas that he is all too happy to tell. 

Lucas’s money runs out at one point so Ten offers him a job. _You already spend most of your time here,_ he gives as a reason. _Might as well do it while earning something._

While working alongside Ten, it becomes all the more evident that he is infatuated with Jungwoo’s boss. Lucas likes to tease him for it, poking Ten’s side with his elbow when Johnny comes through the door, flour still on his hands and clothes. 

Lucas’s reactions have greatly improved since he started this job, not wanting to let good alcohol go to waste simply because Ten has a tendency to drop whatever he is holding when he spots Johnny before slipping his relaxed mask back over his face. 

The relaxed mask with which he will stare right back, raise his eyebrows, and say, _do I have to remind you why Jungwoo is not allowed to stay over at the inn anymore?_ Lucas always flushes and shakes his head. But at the same time, he is kind of proud, three noise complaints in one night is quite a feat. 

On sundays, Lucas joins Jungwoo for church mass. Neither of them are religious, Jungwoo’s father however was and Jungwoo kept up the tradition, so Lucas joins him. It isn’t that bad after all, Taeil has quite a pleasant voice to listen to. 

But nothing beats Jungwoo’s voice. Lucas will come earlier to dinner just to hear Jungwoo sing while he cooks with his dozen cutting boards and a hundred more herbs placed on top of them. 

Sometimes Lucas joins in himself with singing, but most often he just wants to sit at the kitchen table with closed eyes and listen. 

He himself sings mostly when he’s riding. His voice is in no range like Jungwoo’s but he sings his lungs out anyway. It’s a habit Lucas picked up in the north, where the days are short and the nights are long and loneliness is hard to avoid. Back then there was only a limited arsenal that Lucas had in songs, but nonetheless he sang them loud and clear to keep the shadows at bay. 

During the late hours of the night, when his horse was tired and both of them scared of not waking up if they gave in to sleep, he found himself returning to the song his mother always sang to calm him down when he’d had a nightmare. When his thoughts were racing so hard he couldn’t pay attention to one of her stories. 

He doesn’t remember all the words to the song, but to this day the melody still does the trick to calm down his horse and himself.

Now, Lucas finds he is unconsciously picking up lyrics from Jungwoo, and he sings them as he rides through the forests surrounding the village. The songs are about sunrises and dreams of bodies wound together tightly. These are lyrics that Lucas is unfamiliar with, having before only sung marching anthems or words about undiscovered places. But the new ones are growing on him a little bit more every day. 

In the beginning of his stay, he would take his horse out every morning almost religiously, but throughout the weeks, that number has gone down. Still, Lucas keeps at it. Especially in the early morning hours when he knows the town is still asleep, he finds himself saddling up his horse and exploring the surroundings, looking for tracks. 

There have been two sightings since he came to the village, one by a woman that sells fruits on the market every weekend, swearing that she saw red skin flying through the sky, the other—and more trustworthy one—being by Ten, especially more trustworthy because the first thing Ten did was tell Lucas to _get the fuck outside and come look._

Lucas ran down the stairs of the inn in his socks and could catch a glimpse of red before the beast disappeared behind a mountain. He saw it from a distance, sure, but there was no mistaking the giant wings. Not a minute later he was lacing up his boots and getting his horse from the stable. 

He did not catch the dragon that night, or the following one. It having gone as quickly as it came, vanished, disappeared off the face of the earth. 

Lucas loves the chase. And sometimes he can feel he is close, can almost feel the heat of fire prickling on his skin. The dragon has been getting spotted more and more frequently since the night Ten saw it, but no one can give him a precise location. At this point, it has come to be more about the task of locating the dragon than actually finding it. 

Jungwoo asks him one day what he’s going to do once he does find it. Lucas hadn’t thought that far ahead. With the water serpent, it had been about crossing the bridge that hung over the waves the serpent resided under, and living to tell the tale. With the dragon, there is no real goal. So Lucas tells Jungwoo he wants to see the beast with his own eyes, stand before it with his own two legs. See if it’s true to the legends. 

And legends there are. Kids will grow up listening to stories about witches that ride brooms and, just depending on where in the land you live, many more. 

The kids in the east are told about the monsters that hide in the desert that suck you deep. Outsiders think that it’s a quick process, but the easterners know better. They know you don’t die of suffocation but of dehydration. It can take days before your body is completely drowned in the sand. The southerners grow up less on lore about their environment and more on gossip about the folks in town. The south is one big political game that in itself is more dangerous than some monsters in other tales. 

The children in the north learn early on about the giants, and how to leave them alone and let them sleep. And the west, the west tells more tales then there is time in a human life. 

All places have their own legends, their own warning signs, their own bedtime stories parents tell their kids to get them to behave. The stories in this country being altered to specific regions, sometimes even specific villages. But all children grow up knowing the basic ones. 

They grow up knowing not to not fuck with faerie rings, and they grow up knowing there was a period in time when dragons lived. That time has long since passed and anyone who tells you otherwise is either drunk or a fool. At least that is the lie people have been trying to push for generations. The belief that dragons have completely vanished is more out of fear than out of truth.

Nonetheless, there are still thousands of tales about knights riding off to save damsels in distress from towers encircled by fire breathing monsters with golden eyes and flapping wings. Lucas grew up wanting to be the guy in shining armor. His mother would shake her head and tell him a fishing rod was as good as a gleaming sword. 

Jungwoo says maybe he should get one, a sword. The look on Jungwoo’s face is playful when he suggests it, but his eyes read otherwise. Lucas goes to Hendery the next day and asks for something that can pierce through dragon skin. Hendery almost laughs him out of the shop but says he’ll try for the next best thing. 

The next best thing being the most beautiful sword Lucas has ever set his eyes on. The handle is smooth and the grip soft despite the leather. She’s light in his hand but heavy enough to remind him of what he is holding. The sword costs a month and a half of his pay that he earns at the inn but there is no way in hell Lucas is saying no to a sword this balanced. 

Hendery tells him to name her. So from that point on Lucas carries Xuxi, and he does so with pride.

* * *

During the months that he spends in the village, Jungwoo lets him into his life, but only into a tiny piece of it. 

They go out. To have fun, to drink, to dance. Jungwoo cooks for him from time to time and sings to him even more. Lucas teaches him how to ride his horse. She isn’t scared of Jungwoo, it’s quite the opposite, she takes an instant liking to him and Lucas gets the feeling she even prefers Jungwoo with his magical voice over her actual owner. Lucas’s horse loves Jungwoo, and so Lucas falls just a little bit more in love with him as well. 

Lucas learns to know Jungwoo’s body as well as his own. And just like Lucas knows he will never be done exploring the world, he thinks he will never quite be finished with trying to figure out every inch of Jungwoo. Whereas Lucas’s body is cold, Jungwoo’s is flaming hot. It’s like a heat resides in his body, wanting to be pushed out. Lucas can’t wait to taste it when it does. 

One night Jungwoo tells him how his father died. They’re lying in bed, Jungwoo’s head resting on Lucas’s chest, while Jungwoo talks about the big mill fire from years ago. 

In total it took fifteen people’s lives. Including that of Jungwoo and Ten’s fathers. 

Jungwoo doesn’t cry while he speaks. He throws the words out like they are textbook facts. _My father died in a fire. Burned to the ground like the mill he worked in._

Lucas holds him just a bit tighter, presses him just a bit closer. 

“Thank you,” Jungwoo whispers into his chest. Lucas strokes his hair, presses a kiss to his scalp, and whispers back that it’s alright. 

They have an arrangement, over the months it has evolved from a casual one into a more serious one, but there is still one strict rule. They don’t spend the night. 

When the time comes in the evening where Lucas normally leaves, Jungwoo for the first time asks him to stay. They don’t have sex that night, they just fall asleep with Jungwoo’s head still on Lucas’s chest, Lucas carding his fingers through Jungwoo’s hair and his arm wrapped around his tiny frame to keep the nightmares at bay, his other hand linked with Jungwoo’s smaller one. Somehow it feels more intimate than any night they’ve been together. 

Lucas wakes up with Jungwoo still in his arms, dried up tear streaks on his face. He strokes his thumb over Jungwoo’s cheeks, wraps him even closer and doesn’t come in for work that day.

After that night both of them open the gates to their thoughts just a bit wider. 

They go for long rides and spend nights in other villages, never staying too long, always sure to go back to Jungwoo’s home before too many days pass. 

They talk about maybe going west one day. The underlying saying of _and never coming back_ goes unspoken, but they both know it’s there. 

During a walk through the market, Lucas confesses he doesn’t know if his mother is actually dead. He doesn’t know why he says it, at that moment most of all, in such a public place, Jungwoo next to him trying to decide between two cucumbers. But he felt comfortable saying it so he confesses it again, shares with Jungwoo the deepest fear that he has locked in his brain. 

“I don’t know if she lives or if she doesn’t.” 

Jungwoo doesn’t ask why he does not know. Jungwoo does not ask why he never went back to check. Jungwoo does not call him a bad son. Instead, he places both of the cucumbers back on the stand and takes Lucas’s hand. Jungwoo does not need to say anything, Lucas understands his silence. It gives him more comfort than any pitying words others could have given him. Lucas squeezes Jungwoo’s hand and smiles. 

Lucas is not yet done exploring this world, but maybe the world can wait for a little bit longer. And when he is ready, Lucas might take someone with him to see what she has in store for both of them.

* * *

The dragon comes out of nowhere one day, with its red skin and golden eyes. Its wings are so big, it feels like they could blow away the entire city in one clean sweep. 

The people come out with their pitchforks and torches. Some carry swords and Lucas realizes he is not the only one that is prepared. The villagers have not holed up in their fear, they’ve used it to channel their anger and are thirsty for revenge. In response to the on marching attack, the dragon releases fire upon the northern part of town. It seems more like a defense mechanism than anything else. And after one outburst, the beast flies off. 

The first thing Lucas does is rush to the stable to set all the horses free. He combs through all of them for his own and rides with her to the southern edge of town, away from the fire. Not because he is scared, but because his first instinct is to find Jungwoo. Even in this part of town, it is chaos, people grabbing buckets, basins, pitchers, anything that can hold an ounce of water. Some even take off their own shoes to use them. In all the commotion, Lucas can’t find Jungwoo. He isn’t at his house, so Lucas leaves his horse there to avoid her getting trampled in the dark and only then does he run back and help the villagers carry water to the burning houses. 

One of the buildings that burns down is Ten’s tavern, it burns down until there is not a salvageable piece left. He and Lucas watch it get reduced to ash, the fire having spread too far for anything to be saved. It’s almost a crime, how beautiful it is while being destroyed. The bottles filled to the brim with alcohol only helping the fire spread faster. It feels like one sick joke. 

In the aftermath, Lucas finds Ten staring at the embers with unshed tears in his eyes. _Fuck this village,_ Ten says and starts to laugh. He falls to his knees and does not stop. 

Jungwoo finds them in the early morning, stumbling over to where he and Ten have not moved from their spot before the inn. Jungwoo drags himself over to them looking torn to pieces. He brings news that makes Ten tear apart even more. 

It takes a full day for the smoke to completely clear out, but it leaves behind wounds that cut deeper than time and stay longer than burn marks.

* * *

Hendery’s shop is busier than ever before, the entire village has come out of their homes to request weapons to kill a dragon with. The people don’t even care that his steel can’t cut through the scales, they just want to feel like they are prepared. 

To Lucas’s surprise, Ten doesn’t leave, even though there is nothing left for him in this village. Unemployed and with the man that he loves dead, Ten does not pack his bags and get as far away from this town as he can. Instead, he gathers up Lucas and twenty more men and tells them to help him build if they ever want to taste a drop of good ale again. 

Lucas admires him for it, and there is a split second where he wonders what would have happened if he himself had stayed in his own village. The taste in his mouth turns sour and he can feel the wicked face of his mother threatening to surface so he banishes the thought as quickly as it came. 

Ten lets him stay with him in Johnny’s house, because even now, Lucas does not want to force Jungwoo into letting him move in. He knows neither of them are ready for it yet, Jungwoo least of all. 

Lucas asks three times if it’s really okay with Ten that he moves in. By the fourth time Ten snaps and hisses, _who else is going to live in it?_ Lucas clamps his mouth shut and accepts the spare key without any more pushback. 

They drink more than before, especially Ten. Lucas tries to cut him off after two glasses every evening but all he gets in return is a mean glare. 

Every night, Ten asks Lucas to join him on the couch. Johnny’s old house is so starkly different from Jungwoo’s, Lucas wonders if he doesn’t get transported to a different town every time he enters it. 

Whereas Jungwoo’s home is littered with pages with formulas written on them, books as old as time itself and plants that curl in every direction, Johnny’s house is pristinely clean. There is not a piece of furniture in the wrong spot. The space is open whereas Jungwoo’s is cluttered. Pictures line the shelves—or at least they did, before Ten tossed them all in a box and put them in the attic. One picture remains though, one of Johnny alone, wearing a smile so blinding it almost can’t be contained inside the frame. Ten didn’t have the heart to let it collect dust in a moving box, so now it collects dust in the corner of a cabinet in the living room instead.

It’s the first thing Ten lays his eyes on whenever he enters the room. 

Every night, Ten asks him to tell him something, not a story, no, he asks Lucas to tell him of a place. _Tell me of somewhere better,_ he’ll say. Lucas complies because at least it keeps Ten from refilling his glass. 

Every night they sit on the couch and Lucas tells him of a town he has stayed in. Ranging from the ones up north where the children would ambush him with snowballs as soon as he rode through the gate, to the large cities in the west where they have entire hospitals filled with the latest technology instead of just a doctor that comes on house visits when called. 

Ten dreams away with him at the thought of going back to all those places, and somewhere in Lucas’s stomach the lust of travel returns. It’s still only a rumble, like a minor stomach ache, but it is there nonetheless. Lucas sees the way Ten’s eyes shine when he talks about fountains in the middle of city centers and men who go out to fish at dawn and return when the sun has set again. Lucas sees the lust he feels reflected in Ten’s eyes. Maybe, he thinks, Jungwoo and he can find a third horse for someone who wants to see the world just as much as them. 

Jungwoo falls ill three weeks into the restoration process of the northern part of town. 

Ten lets him forgo his help with rebuilding the inn to be with Jungwoo as much as he can. Lucas spends hours at his bedside trying to get the fever down but it is no use. No matter how much medicine he feeds Jungwoo, no matter how many towels with cold water he places on his forehead, his face, his entire body, Jungwoo’s temperature does not go down. It’s quite the opposite, it seems to increase by the day. 

Lucas sleeps in nothing but his underwear and lets Jungwoo kick the blankets off the bed. He shivers through the night but keeps doing it anyway, in the hope that his cold body can make Jungwoo feel some kind of relief. The poor boy next to him sweating so much it could fill buckets, making both of them wake up in drenched sheets every morning. 

By the second week into this arrangement, Jungwoo tells Lucas in a voice barely more than a whisper to fetch him his books. He points out pictures of herbs on the pages and tells Lucas to cut them up and boil them. 

Lucas doesn’t know why Jungwoo trusts him with a task like this, he thinks Jungwoo is starting to suffer from memory loss because he must have forgotten that they’ve been eating nothing but Lucas’s burnt cooking for the past two weeks. But still, he does as he is told. Cuts what Jungwoo wants him to, boils it, steams it, throws it all together and holds it out for Jungwoo to drink. And Jungwoo must actually be off his fucking rockers because he takes the slimy purple potion that Lucas has cooked up and downs it in one gulp. He throws it all up in the next breath, wipes his mouth with the back of his hand, looks back up at Lucas with a gaze sharper than he has shown in days and says, _again._

Apparently, the horehound wasn’t boiled long enough. The second time Jungwoo drinks the potion, it stays down. His body tenses up completely and then he screams. Lucas is at his side the next second, cradling him close and rocking his body back and forth. 

“Tell me where it hurts, Jungwoo,” he pleads. “Please baby I want to help.” 

Jungwoo can’t give a concrete answer and Lucas realizes it’s because his entire body hurts. Lucas realizes this because his hands burn when he touches Jungwoo. His boy screams like he is being torn to shreds. Lucas carries him over to the shower and turns the faucet on. He puts the setting on as cold as it can go and holds Jungwoo flush against his chest, for he is unable to stand on his own legs. 

The minutes tick by second by agonizing second and slowly, Jungwoo’s body starts to lose it’s piping hotness and returns to a body with a normal human temperature. 

Lucas turns the shower off as Jungwoo’s screams stop. He does not cry. Instead, Jungwoo sinks down onto the floor of the shower and sits on the ground as the water runs down the drain. 

“Please leave,” he says, arms wrapped around his knees. 

There is nothing in the world that Lucas would rather do than stay but Jungwoo repeats to him again, with a stronger voice this time, “Please leave, Lucas.” 

Lucas tries to lift him up to get him back to bed but Jungwoo doesn’t budge. So Lucas lets himself slide down the shower wall and sit on the damp floor, his already soaked pants ruining even further. He leans his head back against the wall and closes his eyes. He’ll sit here all night if he has to. 

Sometime later Jungwoo crawls over to him and huddles against his side. One of his hands searches out Lucas’s and he laces their fingers together, he squeezes. _I’m sorry._

Lucas inhales and places his head on top of Jungwoo’s that’s resting on his shoulder. He squeezes back. _I know._

* * *

Everyone tries to go back to how it was. Lucas going back to work at the tavern when it’s so far built that it can house all the bottles Ten wants on the shelves again. 

He does still go out most mornings to ride, but he doesn’t go far anymore, doesn’t go up the mountain passes or into the caves. 

He keeps living with Ten, who has been trying to cut down on his drinking. Lucas moved the frame of Johnny from the corner of the cabinet to the front two weeks ago. Ten has yet to move it back. 

Lucas keeps accompanying Jungwoo to church mass on sundays. They go to the market after, pick out the things Jungwoo has on his list for that evening to cook. Instead of sitting at the table, Lucas helps cut the vegetables. There is more space now, Jungwoo having cleared out the kitchen counters of the overfull cutting boards and haphazard cutlery. 

The books too, look more organized. There are still stacks of them in every corner of the house but they are straightened. Most of the pages smudged with ink and indescribable lettering are pushed into drawers and locked away. The wine bottles stay on the bookshelf, they tried putting them in a real storage rack but it looked too put together so out the window it went. 

Jungwoo is starting to smile more often, to sing a little louder, to dance a little wilder. He kisses differently too. One night when Lucas makes love to him, Jungwoo guides the hand that Lucas has resting on his hip to lay at the side of his head. He interlaces Lucas’s fingers with his own and kisses Lucas through his orgasm. He kisses him longingly, like he doesn’t want it to end. 

There are days where Jungwoo disappears, where he holes himself up in his house and refuses to open the door. Those are the days where Lucas joins Ten when he opens a second bottle on a weekday. 

Everyone tries to go back to how it was. But still, the aftermath leaves a bad taste in the back of Lucas’s mouth. Something doesn’t quite sit right with him, and neither does it with the villagers. One good look and you can see that they are on edge. One good look into their homes and you can see they are prepared. The other shoe has yet to drop, and when it will, they will not let it fall very far. 

It isn’t until months later, long after the dragon has made more and more appearances—none of them too close to the village, always staying a calculated distance away—that Lucas finds himself in the same setting as the night he first slept in Jungwoo’s bed.

Jungwoo’s head is on his chest, Lucas’s hand in his hair, the smell of sex lingering on their naked bodies and around the room. 

“My father always seemed like he was burning up,” Jungwoo says. “He would lash out with his anger, sometimes at me, sometimes at others.” 

Lucas doesn’t comment, he keeps his mouth shut and lets Jungwoo speak. 

“One day it got too much, so I ran off, right into the woods.” Jungwoo lets out a dry laugh. “I met a witch there.” Lucas’s hand stops automatically, his body tenses up of its own accord. He freezes. Jungwoo feels it. “I know, you probably think I’m mad.” 

Lucas commands his body to relax, he commands his lungs to breathe again, and one by one his muscles slowly lose their tension. He does not dare try to recall her voice. It takes everything in his mind to not let those five words re-enter his thoughts. 

“I don’t think you’re mad at all,” he says once his throat eases so he can push the words through. 

“I made a deal.” Jungwoo swallows audibly. Lucas can feel himself copying him. “I was so mad Lucas, so mad.” He shakes his head, his hair tickling against Lucas’s chest. “I told her I wished my father would be swallowed by his own rage.” It takes a moment for the words to sink in, but when they do, Jungwoo doesn’t need to say anything more. They both know what happened next, they both know what caused the death of Jungwoo’s father. So Lucas lets the quiet settle around them. 

“To this day, I still feel guilty for Ten,” Jungwoo admits before once again falling quiet. 

Lucas lets his hand card through Jungwoo’s hair again. He wants to tell Jungwoo that it isn’t his fault. But there is one thing more pressing on his mind.

“What did she look like?” he asks, not being able to keep his curiosity contained. _Did she have a wart too? Crooked nails? Did her breath smell rotten?_

Jungwoo’s breath stops, it is only for less than a second but Lucas heard it. It continues steadily as Jungwoo allows himself to remember. “Brown hair, so long it almost touched the ground. I think I had her eyes. My dad always said I did.” 

Lucas pauses again, this is not how he remembers his own encounter. Then again, there can’t only be one witch in this world. Still, the differences are stark. “Her eyes?” 

“My mom’s eyes,” Jungwoo clarifies. He is still facing away from Lucas, talking to the door instead of Lucas’s face. His voice has dropped down another decimal. This is the first time Jungwoo has mentioned her. 

“She looked like your mom?” 

A beat. “How I imagined her to be, yeah.” 

This time Jungwoo does turns around to look up at him, his wide eyes even noticeable in the dark. He turns his entire body around and settles himself against Lucas’s chest again. 

“Could you sing for me?” he asks. 

So Lucas does. He gathers up all the melody and lyrics he knows from his mothers’ song and sings it now to the boy in his arms. When he doesn’t know a word he makes one up. Jungwoo falls asleep halfway through the second verse. 

That’s the last time Lucas spends the night. Because in the morning, Jungwoo is not there when he wakes up.

* * *

Jungwoo is not in the house, or at the church. He is not at the inn or with Ten. The woman who always sells them her best apples hasn’t seen him and neither has Hendery. Lucas searches the entire village, twice. 

He rides out into the woods the same day and combs through the entire forest. He turns over every stone and looks behind every tree. He keeps his eyes out for hidden passages and his ears out for unusual sounds. This wouldn’t be the first time the woods goad a human into their shadows. 

The next day he rides to the closest village and asks everyone in it if they have seen a boy with blonde hair and a voice as soft as a feather. _No,_ they tell him. _Hasn’t been here._

So Lucas tries the next village, and the next, and the one that lies beyond that. There is no person who has seen him, no trace of Jungwoo left behind. He has fallen off the face of the earth. Disappeared overnight. 

Lucas does not believe in god, but he goes back to church to pray for Jungwoo’s return anyway. Here he finds Taeil, sitting in the first row of the benches and moving aside when he hears the doors open, making room for Lucas to join him. 

There is a heavy silence in the building as both men stare at the golden altar at the front. Lucas only now realizes that it is the only piece of decoration in the entire church. The walls are white and bare, the windows are big and open but don’t hold stained glass inside of them. 

Lucas doesn’t know how long they sit there, how much time passes before Taeil starts to talk. 

When he does, Lucas learns him and Jungwoo are not the only ones that have encountered a witch in their lives, Taeil has had his own experience as well. 

Taeil tells him of a witch with blonde hair and a grin as sharp and more cutting than a razor blade. Dimples when he laughs and eyes like storms when he was angry. 

Taeil tells Lucas he used to love a man that looked like that. A man that wore striped cardigans that were too big for his body and refused to put on his reading glasses because he kept saying he didn’t need them. A man that looked and talked and acted exactly like the man Taeil faced. The witch asked him to stay, but Taeil refused. 

“I buried my own husband, I lowered his casket into the grave myself,” Taeil says, shaking his head. “The man before me was not Kun. The dead do not rise overnight, they don’t wake up and become of the living again.” 

Taeil refused the witch’ offer and instead of a punishment, they gave him a blessing. Reunion in death is what the witch gave him. In return, Taeil has to live out his life fully. 

“If I can see him in the afterlife, I’ll live out this rotten one,” Taeil says. “Talk to Ten, he has seen them also.” 

So Lucas takes his horse and his sword and his leftover hope and goes to his only true friend in this cursed village. 

He swings open the doors to the tavern and pulls Ten from behind the bar and into the newly constructed storage room. 

“The witch,” Lucas starts with before the door is even fully closed behind them, “you’ve met her.” 

Ten’s body tenses up in the way Lucas’s did when Jungwoo first told him he met a woman in the woods who wielded magic. 

Ten takes a sharp intake of breath and says, “Him. I’ve met him.” Ten looks off to the side as his face twists into a nasty smile. “Oh I’ve met him alright.” 

Lucas releases his death grip on Ten’s shoulders and takes a step back to give the man space. “What happened?” he asks. 

Ten’s eyes are shooting with anger when he looks back at Lucas, the nasty smile still curling over his lips. “I fell in love with him.” Ten sighs and lets himself slump down onto one of the boxes in the storage room, the fight leaving his body. 

The man before Lucas is nothing like how he presents himself to others. The man he sees now is fragile, vulnerable. How only Lucas got to see him the first weeks after Johnny died. 

“Why do you think I ask you to tell me about all your travels, Lucas?” Ten says more than asks. “Why do you think I want to know all about the rest of the world? About places that are anywhere but here?” 

Lucas always thought Ten wanted to travel as much as he did, but it turns out he wants it even more. Lucas cocks his head to the side. “Tell me why, Ten.” 

“Because all I ever wanted was to leave so that son of a bitch cursed me to stay,” he spits. 

For the second time that day, Lucas finds himself listening to a story, hanging onto every word. 

Ten keeps the details to himself, the days of happiness he shared in the woods with a person he now detests locked deep away in his mind behind metal bars. He does talk about red hair and brown eyes, an appearance that would change when Ten turned too fast or blinked too quickly. Ten explains waking up next to a different person one night, scared out of his wits that the entire thing was a dream, only to wake up the next morning to a fully set breakfast table and the man he thought he knew and recognized scraping bacon onto two plates. 

From there on out it all seemed too perfect, from there on out all he wanted was to leave. Witches have enough spells to lock doors and windows, let alone entire houses. Ten figured that out the hard way. 

“Do you think Jungwoo’s with the witch?” Lucas asks. 

Ten shrugs his shoulders. “That’s possible but also unlikely.” 

Lucas frowns his eyebrows in thought. “Why?” 

Before Ten gives his answer, he opens one of the storage boxes and takes out a bottle of vodka. He opens it and throws it back, swallows the liquid without a grimace. He holds the bottle out for Lucas, who accepts it but doesn’t drink.

“He has met them before, right?” 

Lucas holds off his reply, this is not his secret to share. 

Ten scoffs. “Oh please, you think I didn’t know.” 

“Know what?” 

“That Jungwoo killed my father.” 

Lucas is ready to defend Jungwoo’s name in his absence, explain that no one knows how magic works until it has already cast its spell. But before he can get a word out, Ten holds up his hand. Lucas’s mouth snaps shut automatically. 

“You don’t need to defend him, I forgave him ages ago.” 

Jungwoo didn’t tell Lucas that. “The way he told it made it seem like you had never spoken about it. Any of it.” 

Ten places his chin on his hand. “We never did,” he says, a sad look creeping upon his face. “Jungwoo started avoiding me after the fire happened. I tried to take care of him but he wouldn’t even let me near him.” Ten motions for the bottle, the number inked on the inside of his wrist peeking out from the sleeve that covers it. Lucas hands him the vodka. “He kept saying how bad things happened to the people around him that were out of his control. At the time, I thought it was his way of grieving,” Ten takes a swig, “but after I had my own encounter with the witch and got cursed to die in this village, I came to realize that what Jungwoo carried was guilt, not grief.” He takes another sip, holds the bottle out for Lucas again. Lucas shakes his head. 

Ten shrugs. “Your loss.” 

He takes Lucas back home and puts him to bed, tells him that he needs to be patient, that Jungwoo will turn up eventually. _He has disappeared before right?_ Ten asks him. _What’s different this time?_

Ten flubs down next to him and once his breathing evens out Lucas gets back up. They both know this time it’s not the same, this time Lucas’s patience is running out. He cannot and will not sit here helpless while Jungwoo is off to god knows where, doing god knows what. 

Lucas takes his horse and marches to the edge of the city and into the forests again. He combs through it three times. At one point he realizes that he’s going in circles, the realization that he isn’t leading himself that way, but something else is, soon following. 

It seems he cannot exit the woods, no matter how hard he tries to steer his horse back to the village. Maybe Ten was right, maybe he should have just waited back at the house, stayed where it was safe, sat on his ass and done nothing. Lucas wants to laugh at the thought. 

His horse whines when they come back to the same place for the fourth time in a row. A wooden cabin stands not two miles away from them hidden by the shadows of the trees. Up close, it looks abandoned, the wood rotten in many places and the roof seems like it could be torn down by a wind that carries a bit too hard. The smoke that’s coming out of the chimney is the only sign of life. 

Lucas doesn’t know what is going to be behind that door. He doesn’t know what he expects to find. Does he want Taeil’s husband with the sharp eyes? Does he want the witch with her wart or the one with long brown hair? The only thing Lucas knows is that he wants to find Jungwoo. 

The man who opens the door has a sharp smile that could cut through his own slender figure. He has the red hair Ten described and there is a slit going through his left eyebrow. When he opens his mouth, his voice is so soft it could shatter. His breath smells like rotten goat cheese. 

The witch opens the door wider and in Jungwoo’s voice they invite Lucas in. Lucas steps forward over the threshold and does not look back.

* * *

The witch offers him tea but Lucas does not accept. The person before him is not a fae but Lucas does not trust anything that they have to offer him. Not in terms of food, or drink, and certainly not in the terms of deals. 

The witch doesn’t seem to mind, they smile at him. It’s a piercing smile that shows teeth. 

The walls of the living room are covered with hides of dead skinned animals. From where he is standing, Lucas can see that the shelves of the kitchen are lined with differently shaped bottles. 

Lucas recognizes some of the contents from Jungwoo’s own stash of herbs. Like the horehound and the unmistakable white of moly. There are hairs in some and indescribable fluids in others, Lucas looks away, right into the smiling face of the witch. 

“Is he here?” Lucas asks. He doesn’t have time for games, he wants what he came for and nothing else. 

The witch chuckles and takes a seat. They motion for Lucas to settle down as well. Lucas refuses. 

If you’d have told him a year ago that he would stand face to face again with a witch that could shatter his entire body with a snap of their fingers, Lucas would’ve laughed and said you’d have to be mad to think he would even dare come close to a witches’ den again. But now, a year later, looking this creature in the face with only one goal burning in the back of his head, fear is the last thing on his mind. “Is he here?” Lucas asks again. 

“No,” they respond, plucking a piece of dust off their cardigan like Lucas isn’t ready to burn up with rage right in front of them. 

“Then where?” 

A smile enters their face again. “I want something in return.” 

“Fuck you,” Lucas spits out.

“Lucas, we both know magic always comes at a cost.” They say it so simply, so uncaringly. Like this entire exchange is boring them. 

Lucas throws open the door and storms out of the house. He is not making another deal, playing another game. He mounts his horse. 

“Wait,” the witch says. They’re positioned in the door opening, leaning against the frame, still looking like they have all the time in the world. “I’ll take your horse,” they say, like it just occurred to them that a horse is something they’d like to own. 

Lucas is ashamed that he considers it, even if it’s just a flash through his mind, the consideration was there. He is ashamed that he sits on the back of his trusted horse and considers, for even a split second, to give her up. 

“Your horse for Jungwoo’s location, I don’t want anything else,” they say. “I promise,” they add with a sincerity Lucas knows is not genuine. He wants to tear it off their face. 

Lucas wants to turn away and leave the witch behind forever, find Jungwoo on his own. But his horse doesn’t move. She stays rooted in the same spot and refuses all Lucas’s attempt to get her to leave. 

The witch actually starts to laugh. “It seems like the choice isn’t even yours to make.” They hiccup and Lucas can’t help it, it sounds so much like Jungwoo whenever Lucas tries to get a laugh out of him by doing something stupid. 

“No,” Lucas says. 

His horse whinnies under him. 

“No,” Lucas repeats more forcefully, this time to his horse. “No.” 

She throws him off her back. And that is the moment Lucas knows he lost the argument. She has never done anything like that. Not when her hooves were frozen in the north or when she was dehydrated and on the verge of death in the desert. His horse has never disobeyed him. She has always been loyal, she has always pulled through. And, Lucas guesses, that is also what she is trying to do now. Pull through. 

Lucas won her in a gambling match and now he will lose her to another gamble. 

His horse walks up to the witch with her head held high, her tails flops and she plants her hooves steadfast on the ground. 

One second, she stands, as solid as a rock. The next, she is down on the ground, in pain and dying. 

Lucas’s body moves on its own. He is at her side in less than a second. The life is slowly draining out of her eyes and he can see that it hurts. Can almost feel the pain she is going through. He places his hand on her nose and whispers in her ear that she is brave. He hums the tune they both know so well. It takes agonizingly long. She is in so much pain, so much torture, her eyes are begging him to end it. 

As Lucas draws his sword, the villagers of the town gather their own weapons. Some carry swords like Lucas, others axes, bows, and spears. 

As Lucas cuts the throat of his horse, the villagers march north up into the mountains. They feel fear, yes, but revenge is the biggest thing on their minds. 

As Lucas lets the blood seep into the cloth on his knees, the villagers start their own bloodbath. 

He stays until she stops breathing, until her body stops shaking and he is left with nothing but a carcass. And then still, he stays. He hums the last verse of the song all the way till the end and whispers, _I’m sorry._ Because he is, and he can already feel that he is going to be for a long time, his heart already getting a spot ready for regret. 

He buries his face into her hide and gives himself a minute to remember her before he kisses her between her eyes, and then, and only then, does he rise. And with it, his fury rises too. 

He turns to the witch, still standing in the door opening, that god awful grin still on their face. Lucas wants to smack it off, wants to pummel them into a pulp. The grip on his sword tightens, the leather smooth in his hand. He wants to add more blood to what already clings to the metal. 

Lucas can be very patient over long periods of time, he can stay very calm and collected. He is proud of this feature, it is what made him a good fisherman. Lucas also knows that he can lose that calmness, he knows that when he does he is more dangerous than monsters hidden under sand, more dangerous than the beasts with big wings and fire for breath, more dangerous than big water serpents. Lucas knows that when he loses his patience, he is more dangerous than a witch with their silly spells. 

In his anger, he almost misses the words said to him. 

“The dragon has him.”

The ringing in his ears dies down and he can now hear the shrieking in the distance, he can smell fire burning. 

“Go on and walk,” the witch says. “You won’t be riding.” 

In that moment Lucas has to make a choice. Instead of drawing his sword back and slashing their throat, he turns around and walks straight towards the sound of flapping wings. 

The witches’ voice changes to something shrill when he turns around and starts walking, letting go of Jungwoo’s one. 

“Oh and Lucas,” they call after him. “Give Ten my regards.”

* * *

Lucas walks for what feels like hours but is in reality not even one rotation of a clock. He feels like he has traveled miles, he hasn’t. 

It is easy to follow the sound, even from far away, the shrieks are so incredibly loud. Lucas pushes his way past the masses, the cries getting louder and louder the closer he comes. 

He arrives in front of a cave, one he has searched before. Only unlike last time, it now houses a huge red dragon with golden eyes and wings so large they are almost folded in half to fit. 

The people have it cornered and Lucas realizes the only reason for them not having left yet is because they can’t get it to die. 

The dragon tries to slink back further into the cave when it sees him. Lucas charges ahead. It lashes out and shrieks. Almost like screams. Screams telling him to get away. Run as far as he can. Get out. 

Lucas doesn’t. He keeps walking. Someone tries to pull him back by the arm but he shakes them off. 

_Jungwoo,_ he thinks, _it has Jungwoo._ Lucas pulls his sword. 

She is light in his hand and practically desperate to be used. He can feel it, the bloodlust. He can recognize it in himself too. 

The dragon lashes out again, and Lucas can feel the people behind him retreat, seek cover. No fire comes out of the beast’s throat. Only those awful awful shrieks. They sound like scraping a fork along the edge of a wine glass. 

Lucas marches ahead, he does not feel fear. Not now. 

His anger still lingers, but he pushes that to the back of his mind for later. Once he has Jungwoo they will figure out what to do. Jungwoo will know how to make him cope. 

Lucas pulls his sword back, takes a deep breath, and plunges it into the dragon’s long neck. And he does it again. And again. And again. The dragon doesn’t fight back. 

He keeps stabbing the same spot repeatedly. Like how he found his mother stab the cutting board all those years ago. 

In all his craze, Lucas forgets the fact that his sword is not supposed to be able to pierce through dragon skin. In all his craze, he misses the eyes that are unmistakably Jungwoo’s. 

After one particularly vicious thrust, he pulls his sword Xuxi out and lets it clatter to the ground. He steps back and only then realizes he is soaked in blood. He tries to clear the mess of his face but wiping at it only makes it worse. 

He looks at his hands covered in red. And then he looks back at the dragon. 

Only where there should have been a fire breathing monster, there is now the corpse of a boy. 

_No,_ Lucas whispers, _no, no, no, no, no._

It feels like a repeat of just an hour ago. Only this time, this time he killed— 

“Jungwoo,” Lucas says as he shakes the body. “Jungwoo please.” 

The crowds come out of their hiding places to gauge what’s going on, the awful shrieks having stopped and been replaced by Lucas’s alarmed voice. 

He takes the boy into his arms and rocks them both. Lucas swipes the hair out of Jungwoo’s eyes and keeps rocking them back and forth all the while whispering, _please, please Jungwoo, please wake up._ Tears are streaming down his face, mixing in with the blood. Jungwoo’s blood. Lucas doesn’t know when he started crying. 

There are ugly cuts in whatever is left of Jungwoo’s neck, the blood is still gushing out. Lucas keeps his eyes on Jungwoo’s own open ones. They look scared. 

“Jungwoo wake up,” he says again. “Jungwoo, we’re supposed to go places.” 

_Jungwoo,_ Lucas repeats like a prayer, _Jungwoo, Jungwoo, Jungwoo, Jungwoo, Jungwoo._

He feels a hand on his shoulder, Lucas looks up into Taeil’s face. To his credit, he doesn’t even bat an eye at Lucas’s appearance. 

“Leave him, Lucas, he isn’t coming back.” 

“We were supposed to see the world together, just him and me,” Lucas tells Taeil. He doesn’t know why he says it, it just seems like it needs to be said. 

Taeil gives him a sympathetic nod. “I know,” he says and squeezes his shoulder. “I know, Lucas.” Taeil moves away and tells everyone to get the fuck out and let him grieve. Somewhere in the back of his mind Lucas wants to thank him, instead he turns back to the boy in his arms.

“The sunflowers Jungwoo, we were supposed to go see the sunflower fields.” 

His own voice in his head is repeating Jungwoo’s names over and over again like a mantra. 

_Jungwoo Jungwoo Jungwoo Jungwoo Jungwoo_

“Jungwoo, please, you can’t just back out now.” Lucas lets out a laugh that sounds more like desperation choked up into a sound. “Baby, please.” 

_Jungwoo Jungwoo Jungwoo Jungwoo Jungwoo_

Lucas brings Jungwoo closer and sobs harder into the crook of his torn-up neck. 

There is another voice in his head, one that is not his, but one he knows all too well just the same. 

_A life for a life, a life for a life, a life for a life._

_Shut up,_ Lucas screams back. _Shut up._

_A life for a life._

This is what you do when you make a deal with a witch when you are fifteen years old and desperate. You scream, _go away._

You know magic always comes at a cost, even when you refuse to pay.

_A life for a life._

This is what you do when magic takes what is hers. You clutch the body tighter. You scream a little louder.

* * *

Lucas loves riding at the break of dawn when the world has not yet woken up. When it is nothing but him, his horse and the land draped in morning sun. 

He likes to leave towns in the early hours when the villagers themselves have not yet woken up. Lucas never stays long in one place after all, there are too many places he has yet to see.

Lucas has felt the cold, ridden through the sand, seen the waves, and not too long ago, he breathed smoke. 

Lucas has seen much, but not enough. There is always more out there, always more to see. Lucas is long not done exploring what this world has to offer him, long not done searching for the mysteries she holds, lying around every corner, waiting to be found. 

That is why, when a priest tells him that the cabin of a witch with a slit through their eyebrow was spotted in the woods a couple of villages over, Lucas does not turn tail and go west. Instead, he asks for the fastest route and sets off for the village closest to the sighting at the ass crack of dawn. He is seen off by a man with his arms blacked out in ink, telling him to return a greeting. 

As he rides, Lucas keeps one hand at the ready. As he rides, Lucas keeps one hand on the leather grip of his sword. As he rides, Lucas does not sing.

**Author's Note:**

> Jungwoo ain’t snoopy in this one. 
> 
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